Editor’s Note: The following references sexual assault.

The Big Picture

Heaven & Earth offers a unique perspective on the Vietnam War, focusing on the experiences of Vietnamese civilians rather than American soldiers. The film highlights the resilience of Le Ly Hayslip, a Vietnamese woman who endured torture, sexual assault, and displacement during the war. Oliver Stone’s decision to tell the story through a female perspective was a departure for the filmmaker and served as a personal exercise in confronting his own experiences with war.

Filmmaker Oliver Stone is no stranger to the Vietnam War. Having fought in the conflict as an infantryman in the U.S. Army, his firsthand knowledge served as the basis for his 1986 Oscar winner, Platoon. Three years later, he revisited the war with Born on the Fourth of July, chronicling fellow soldier Ron Kovic’s (Tom Cruise) harrowing transformation from a superpatriotic patriot to disillusioned anti-war activist after suffering a paralyzing injury.

Having explored the war through the eyes of American troops both abroad and upon their return home to a divided country, Stone eventually set his sights on a decidedly different approach to dramatizing one of modern history’s bloodiest eras. Capping off what would become an unofficial trilogy was Heaven & Earth, the 1993 drama that took audiences to the other side of the Vietnam War as experienced by civilians. The result was an overlooked yet powerful exercise in cinematic empathy, offering a sobering glimpse into the often faceless and nameless innocents whose lives are forever impacted by the tragedy of warfare.

Heaven & Earth During the Vietnam War, a Vietnamese woman struggles hustling on the streets, where she comes face to face with those involved in the conflict around her. Release Date December 25, 1993 Director Oliver Stone Rating R Runtime 140m Main Genre War Genres Drama

What Is ‘Heaven & Earth’ About?

Based on the memoirs When Heaven and Earth Changed Places and Child of War, Woman of Peace, Heaven and Earth tells the story of Le Ly Hayslip (Hiep Thi Le). Living in a South Vietnamese countryside village with her mother (Joan Chen), father (Haing S. Ngor), and siblings, her family’s tranquil existence, like that of millions of others, is forever disrupted by ongoing violence involving the French, Vietnamese, and American militaries vying for dominance over the land and those living among it. As the conflict escalates, Le Ly is caught between the warring South and North Vietnamese armies, each of which regards her and fellow civilians as potential enemies of their respective causes. Enduring the horrors of torture, sexual assault, and displacement, Le Ly’s traumatic loss of innocence takes her on a path to various lifestyles, occupations, and hardships.

As the war rages, she meets and falls in love with Steve (Tommy Lee Jones), an American marine with a traumatic past of his own. Upon fleeing to the United States and settling in California, their relationship gradually deteriorates as Steve’s demons take a devastating toll on the family, and a culture-shocked Le Ly adapts to a new life in a foreign land with her young children. After years in the United States, she returns to her home village in Vietnam with her sons, reconnecting with long-lost relatives and reconciling the past with the present in a cathartic and heartbreaking finale that brings her life-changing journey, and that of her people, full circle.

‘Heaven & Earth’ Gives American Audiences a Different Perspective on the Vietnam War
Image via Warner Bros.

Hollywood war films tend to emphasize the experiences of Americans over those of their counterparts on and near the battlefield. Such depictions of war and its devastating consequences, while not always intentionally, have historically minimized the perspectives of others, making Oliver Stone’s Heaven & Earth a unique outlier in American cinema, presenting a familiar conflict through a largely unfamiliar and eye-opening lens of empathy for American audiences. Platoon and Born on the Fourth of July are undeniably powerful and iconic films, but their scope of firsthand experience is limited to the Western side of an agonizingly lengthy and multifaceted event that impacted millions. By the end of the war, approximately 58,000 American troops died, while millions of Vietnamese civilians between North and South had lost their lives. In other words, for every American who died, dozens of Vietnamese civilians perished.

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Considering this staggering ratio, Stone’s undertaking Le Ly Hayslip’s story of suffering, survival, and resilience is a noble exercise in empathy and a touching thematic accompaniment to his previous Vietnam War films. Not only eschewing an American soldier’s experience in favor of a Vietnamese civilian’s, the film’s prioritization of a female perspective over Platoon and Born on the Fourth of July’s male-centric point-of-view is a breath of fresh air for mainstream American war dramas. Heaven and Earth offers a subjective glimpse into Vietnamese culture through Le Ly’s intimate, lyrical narration, highlighting her spiritual upbringing via the calming and compassionate nature of the Buddhist precepts that ultimately aided her in finding forgiveness for her enemies. A tender and revelatory exposure for Western audiences to the harmonious daily routine and lifestyle that thrived for centuries in the Vietnamese countryside before the war, as well as the painful void created by its subsequent devastation, Heaven & Earth succeeds admirably in its contribution to the cinematic lexicon of wartime dramas.

How Did ‘Heaven & Earth’ Change Oliver Stone’s Filmmaking?

Though he was a firmly established filmmaker by 1993, Oliver Stone was only midway through an impressive run of directing 12 films in 13 years when he made Heaven & Earth, and the film marked a point of personal growth for him as an artist. Before Heaven and Earth, Stone’s films were primarily about men, many of whom lived life on the edge. From Salvador’s crass Richard Boyle (James Woods) and Platoon’s hardened soldiers to Wall Street’s ruthless Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas) and The Doors’ self-destructive Jim Morrison (Val Kilmer), the men populating Stone’s films display a level of intensity predicated on verbal and physical aggression, making his embrace of Le Ly Hayslip’s story a stark and welcome departure.

Assuming the cinematic perspective of a graceful, ethereal woman was a conscious decision for Oliver Stone to try his hand at exploring the human condition through a female gaze. It’s no coincidence that he dedicated Heaven & Earth to his mother. Additionally, having served as an infantryman in Vietnam, Oliver Stone’s experience making Heaven and Earth served as an exercise in confronting his own experiences regarding war. “Doing Heaven and Earth was a way for me, anyway, to pay atonement, and also homage, to the Vietnamese,” he acknowledges. “That was a great movie for me to make.”

What Happened to Le Ly Hayslip?
Image via Warner Bros.

A year after returning to Vietnam in 1986, Le Ly Hayslip started the East Meets West Foundation. With its motto, “Working together to heal the wounds of the war,” the organization is dedicated to supporting Vietnam veterans with medical needs. In 1989, she co-wrote the first of two memoirs, When Heaven and Earth Changed Places, which garnered high praise and exposed American readers to a perspective on the Vietnam War that had been largely unfamiliar in Western culture. Four years later saw the release of her second book, Child of War, Woman of Peace, chronicling her experience in the United States and subsequent return to her home country. After the release of Heaven & Earth, Le Ly further collaborated with Oliver Stone in establishing a rehabilitation center on a 20-acre plot of land in Vietnam.

At 73 years old, Le Ly Hayslip’s journey to hell and back via the horrors of war remains a powerful testimony of strength and resilience. Having seen a side of humanity that’s hidden from most people, her steadfast commitment to transforming personal pain and suffering into compassionate awareness is essential. “It is my fate to be in between,” she says at the end of Heaven & Earth. With one foot in two worlds, whether that be North and South or East and West, she’s an invaluable bridge between cultures. Likewise, her memoirs and Heaven & Earth serve as enduring documents of historical events that continue to affect millions around the globe.

Heaven & Earth is available to rent on Amazon Prime Video in the U.S.

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